


Trying to Smile with Your Heart

by Rsbry_Beret



Category: Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist (TV)
Genre: Leif-centric, M/M, Magic, One-Sided Attraction, Or Is It?, Paganism, Religion, Tarot, Wicca, background Leif/Joan, leif has a ~cruush~, leif pov, so sorry if it’s weird, which is weird Bc I never do it from his pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:07:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25788559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rsbry_Beret/pseuds/Rsbry_Beret
Summary: Leif Donnelly was not the type of person who believed in magic.
Relationships: Leif Donnelly/Joan, Tobin Batra/Leif Donnelly
Comments: 1
Kudos: 14





	Trying to Smile with Your Heart

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Life is Hard by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros
> 
> Disclaimer I am not religious and was never part of a religion but I do practice tarot so do w that what u will I guess.
> 
> Rated T for swearing and a mention of sex. Mentioned homophobia but it’s just a little at the start

Leif Donnelly was not the type of person who believed in magic. 

He was raised Catholic, which was awful because of the whole liking guys thing, and when you grow up around a God that you’re told hates you, it’s hard to want Him to exist. 

Of course, his therapist and his friends keep telling him that there are plenty of churches that support lgbtq+ people, but… Leif wasn’t sure if he could make himself go back, if he was honest, or if he even wanted to. 

Tobin believed in magic, though. 

Not God, or Gods plural, but magic. Healing crystals, burning incense, casting circles— whole-ass-in witchcraft. 

Which was weird, at least for Leif. 

In highschool, Leif and Tobin were the type of friends who shared everything, even beliefs. Tobin was the only person Leif talked to about his doubts in the church, Leif always listened when Tobin laughed about how confused he was the first time he visited the Donnelly household, and he had to say grace before dinner. It was… nice, to have someone he could trust with that. 

Then Leif went to college and Tobin went to jail, and Leif walked away with a degree and semi-confidence in his atheism, and Tobin walked away saying how he felt ‘grounded’ and ‘connected to the earth’. 

They’ve been sharing an apartment for almost five years, now, so Leif is used to the candles and the smell of sage and cinnamon, and Tobin was his best friend so of course Leif supported him. But sometimes it was still weird. 

Like now, for instance. 

Leif and Tobin were sitting on the floor, legs crossed underneath them. Tobin shuffled the tarot cards in his hands, whispering something under his breath, and Leif tried to focus on the fast shuffles and not the way Tobin’s hands moved around the cards. 

“Tobin, I appreciate you doing this for me and all, but you know I don’t exactly  _ believe  _ in it, right?”

Tobin nodded and looked up to meet Leif’s eyes, still mixing the cards. “I know, man. But you looked stressed. Even if you don’t actually care about this stuff, it can still help to see it layed out in front of you.” His hands faltered, and a card fell out of the deck and landed face up- two figures stood on it, with an angel between them. Along the bottom were the words ‘The Lovers’. Tobin picked it up and frowned at it before putting it back in the deck. “Of course, if you don’t  _ want  _ to do this, we don’t have to. It’s up to you, man.”

And the thing was, Leif  _ did _ want to do it. He didn’t put weight on it, didn’t think that  _ energies _ or whatever existed, put Tobin did, and this was how Tobin wanted to help. And Leif wanted Tobin to be happy. 

And maybe he was a little bit curious, too. 

“No, it’s fine,” he said belatedly. 

Tobin nodded once and shuffled the cards one more time before laying them between them, to Leif’s left. “Cool. So first, think of a question.”

Well, that was vague as fuck. Leif squinted at him for a second and Tobin turned red. 

“I mean, like, ‘what can I do to get a promotion’ or ‘how do I welcome love into my life’, etcetera. Try to make the question active, not passive- it’s about guiding you, giving advice, not about telling the future.”

Leif’s mind flashed back to Joan, the fight they had had two days ago and the way they had stormed away from each other. Leif  _ liked _ Joan, and Joan at the very least liked sex with him, but it seemed like every conversation ended with an argument now. He wasn’t sure how to fix it, or if he even wanted to. 

“Do I have to say it out loud?”

Tobin cocked his head to the side. “No, I guess not. It might make it a little easier, but…” He shrugged. 

Leif stared down at the deck, face down. “Okay. I’m ready.”

Tobin smiled at him, then gestured at the cards. “So, first you need to cut the deck, and then draw three cards and put them in a row, face-down.”

Logically, it was just a deck of cards with cool pictures on them. Leif  _ knew _ that, knew that they didn’t mean anything, not really. Knew that it was a way to help people cope with the universe screwing them over, and yet- when he reached out to split the deck, his hands were slow, careful, shaking a little bit. Pushing forward, Leif cut the deck as close to the middle as he could, then picked three cards off the top and lay them down in front of him, a line between him and Tobin. He leaned back, and Tobin was smiling at him, soft and tilted at the edge, like he knew something Leif didn’t. 

Just as gently, Tobin reached and flipped over the first card. 

“This is the tower, reversed.” The picture was upside-down, a stone tower being struck by lightning and two people falling from it, faces scared. “Upright, the tower means sudden, unexpected change. That’s the lighting, here.” Tobin’s pointer finger brushed the card. “Usually it’s associated with negative change, but I consider this a good card. Sometimes, you need something to break apart so you can have a break through.

“Reversed, this card symbolizes a fear of change. The people are afraid as they fall, but we can’t see where they’re going to land, if it will be safe or not. Usually it signifies that you, the querent, are avoiding a change because you’re scared of the outcome.”

Leif realized he was holding his breath, and let it out.  _ It was just make-believe, _ he reminded himself, and tried to steady the tremor in his hands. 

Tobin moved on, flipping over the next card. It showed two kids in a town, one giving the other a goblet filled with white flowers. “This is the six of cups, also reversed. It’s associated with nostalgia, see, with the little kids playing?

“Reversed, it means you might be idealizing the past. The flowers everywhere, right, and how bright the picture is? It could also mean that there’s… something in your past you want to return to.”

For a second, Leif was worried that Tobin was trying to convince him to go back to church, before he realized that he didn’t even know his question, his question had nothing to do with that, and anyway, they didn’t mean anything in the first place. 

Leif followed Tobin’s hands as they glided to the last card and and thought, maybe, the thing from his past that he wanted wasn’t religion at all. Maybe it was a person. 

“Oh, wow. Your last card is the moon, upright.” Tobin pauses for a moment, examining the card, before his eyes flickered up to meet Leif’s and he smiled awkwardly, sitting back. “It’s probably the hardest card in the deck to figure out.

“The crawfish coming out of the pond, that represents fear again. The wolves howling at the moon signify transformations and anxieties. The towers in the background are a metaphorical threshold, and the sea at the back is eventual peace of mind.”

Tobin traced the card for a second before pointing to a yellow trail, leading from the bottom of the card to the horizon. “But there is a clear path. Usually this means that you already know where you want to go, or what you want to do. You just have to face your fears if you want to make it.”

Tobin withdrew his hands, setting them in his lap and looking up at Leif again. Leif blinked at him, looked at his eyes for longer than was normal, probably. 

_ Face your fears _ , he thought.  _ Avoiding a change because you’re afraid of an outcome. Idealizing the past. _

He leaned in.   
  


**Author's Note:**

> Yay!!! Finally a fic that isn’t a get-together, haha. For some reason that’s all I can write?
> 
> I have like five more WIPS but who knows if I’m ever gonna finish them :/
> 
> Follow me on tumblr @Rsbry_Beret and eternal thanks to my proofreader @a-human-pippin-took
> 
> If you leave notes I owe u my first born child :) for real, someone comments “this is cute!” And I straight up start flapping my arms around in a glorious victory dance


End file.
